A federal judge has temporarily blocked former President Donald Trump’s latest effort to bar international students from attending Harvard University, intensifying the legal battle between the Ivy League school and the White House.
US District Judge Allison Burroughs issued the restraining order on Thursday, ruling that the administration cannot enforce the proclamation signed by Trump a day earlier, which sought to bar new foreign students from entering the United States and threatened the visa status of current enrollees at Harvard.
“Harvard’s conduct has rendered it an unsuitable destination for foreign students and researchers,” the proclamation read.
Harvard swiftly amended an existing legal complaint, accusing the administration of waging a “concerted and escalating campaign of retaliation” against the university for exercising its First Amendment rights.
Judge Burroughs, who previously blocked a similar attempt during Trump’s first presidency, said the university had demonstrated that failure to block the policy would lead to “immediate and irreparable injury.”
The Trump administration has already slashed approximately $3.2 billion in federal funding for Harvard and vowed to exclude the university from future grants and contracts. It has also targeted international students—who make up 27% of Harvard’s current enrollment—as part of broader efforts to reshape higher education.
In court filings, Harvard argued that the move had nothing to do with national security or public interest. “The President’s actions… are not undertaken to protect the ‘interests of the United States’ but instead to pursue a government vendetta against Harvard,” the university stated.
The administration has also taken aim at Columbia University, threatening to revoke its accreditation over alleged failures to address harassment of Jewish students. Unlike Harvard, several top institutions have begun complying with federal oversight demands, but Harvard has refused, setting up a major constitutional and political showdown.
